Pocket Full of Posies
by huntress in the dark
Summary: The Philosopher's Stone: Wondrous in its application...and Monstrous in its creation. What bloody past has seeped into the stones of Amestris for the artifact to exist? "We will destroy Death." "No... We have Become Death."


**Chapter One**

Go and catch a falling star,

Get with child a mandrake root,

Tell me where all past years are,

Or who cleft the devil's foot,

Teach me to hear mermaids singing,

Or to keep off envy's stinging,

And find what wind serves

To advance an honest mind. -John Donne

The crisp chilling air whipped through her as she trudged on; each step taking her further from home. 1346 had reared in a bitter winter and 1347 was continuing it with a sense of sadistic joy. The snow crunching below her feet was the only sound she heard in the dead of the early dawn hours. Every now and then her friend Elis would come to mind and she would walk even faster out of anger. He was a traveling merchant that had been sweet to her. She found the attention he gave her every time he came to her village, flattering. They both celebrated the same religion and in her opinion, he was a better catholic than she could ever hope to be. That he should be taken in such a horrible way, left her questioning who it was exactly she was praying to.

"He did everything he was supposed to and he still caught it..." she fumed to herself

By age 16, Angelina's mind was made up. She would leave her home for a part of the world where the air did not carry the stench of the dead with every gust of wind. She would do this before "god" could take her from this earth entirely. There was a merciless killer in the country. The killer was brutal, greedy, and spread fear and hatred faster than any force seen before: the black plague. The sickness had spread through the countryside and all the villages surrounding the tiny village. family was likely next to die.

Before it hit home, she packed her things and left. Her parents and little brother were still sleeping when she bid them goodbye. She preferred this to seeing them die or worse, catch the plague from them. She left the village knowing full-well she might never see her family or friends again, alive or dead…knowing the village could turn into a mass-grave in a matter of weeks.

Every day, someone died. Death was so regular in those days, she would hear others mock it. And as the days passed and the miles between her and her home grew, She too felt her heart harden to the point where she questioned if she'd miss her family.

This was the world she knew. This was the world she hated.

Her stamina was dwindling from the hunger, but despite her stomach's desperate pleas, she never ate the smallest bit of the food she had packed. When Angelina _did_take a rest and dig into her pack, she could imagine the evil spirits around the land even cursing the bread. She cursed at her cowardice but in the end, did not eat it. Instead she threw it in the river. She sat back down and ran both of her hand through her curly brown hair, her callused fingers raked against her scalp. Hunger gnawed at her and tears threatened to form.

"WHAT GOD WOULD WILL THIS!" she shouted to no one and everything at the same time. Every merchant and every traveler spoke of the same thing: that god was punishing the wicked and the sinful. How sinful could her brother be when he was three? How wicked could Elis and her friends have been when all they had shown her was kindness? There was some comfort though, knowing that the priests and monks were not immune. They were dying just as much as the common peasants.

With some effort she pushed herself to her feet. She couldn't afford to waste so much time… I need to keep moving she muttered. It was only after she started moving did she notice, no one was striking her for shouting blasphemy. No one was telling her to "keep her sinful tongue behind her teeth" she smiled grimly and muttered under her breath

"god won't help me…" part of her felt giddy with delight to say such a thing, like she was getting away with some great crime. Yet in her heart, she was beginning to believe this more and more each day.

She did not stop walking before coming to another village, two days later. By then she did not have the strength to neither speak nor take another step. And for her efforts, the village looked to be just as bad if not worse than her home.

It was as if she had not escaped the danger even for a second. She fell to her knees too tired to stand. Curling in a ball, she fell asleep. She could only hope that she would not wake.

It was an hour before someone hoisted her up and took her in. Low and behold, she woke 8 hours later, thinking she had actually been sent to hell for her rebellious thoughts. Instead of the realm of eternal torment however, she was inside a stone room, loaded to the teeth with torches and candles. She sat up in time to see an older teenager, old enough to have the first hints of a beard coming in anyway, walk into the room with another (unlit) torch. His hair was long enough to tie in a ponytail and hang to his shoulders. It may have been the trick of the light, but his eyes looked golden. It had to be a trick of the light. He sat down and started carving something in the wood of the torch. He was half way before he looked up and noticed she was sitting up in the half-darkness.

"You're awake. Here I expected you to be writhing and moaning with a fever." His tone wasn't exactly dispassionate with despair, but there was no fear in it either.

" Why all the fire?"

" It's for the smoke" he told her, returning his attention to his carving. " The smoke balances out the air and keeps away the thing causing this plague"

"… That's… it? You don't believe it's the curse of god?"

He responded with a quick "no way"

She blinked the smoke out of her eyes and coughed it out of her lungs. This person… her savior seemed to pay the smoke no heed. He only blew the dust off his carving and looked at it, like an artist looking for imperfections to correct in an oil painting. He stood up and set the torch on the stone tiles, abandoning it for a thick leather bound book with some sheets of notes that were loosely tucked between the bound pages. That he would even have such a thing in a fire-loaded room seemed daft. He flipped though it, looking for a specific symbol.

"What are you doing?"

"Trying to light the torch"

" So light it with the fire of another torch.""I'm trying something." he insisted, being obstinately vague.

He found a page with an intricate hand drawn symbol.

"Here it is…"

" I could be infected."

"Could be." he muttered absently as he walked over and picked up the unlit torch.

"If I'm infected, you catch the sickness"

"Not possible. I'd be dead by now. Besides, the fire's keeping the disease away."

"What do you mean not possible? Where have you been? This disease affects everyone!"

" If your infected, I can't tell. And until you start showing symptoms, there's nothing I can do to treat them."

"You're waiting for me to get sick?"

"I'm waiting for to _prove_ you're sick."

"Why aren't you looking at me when you're talking to me?"

"Because I don't need eyes to talk to a person" he told her in a tone that was so calm, it was infuriating. He had yet to look her in the face since that first instant. Angelina frowned. How dare this person… this.. _degenerate_not even given her the decency of eye contact when he spoke.

"Look you-!"

"You're not a noble. If you were, you would have left as fast as your horse could take you. You're not even part of this village, otherwise someone would have seen you before."

As he lectured her, his hands moved his knife and carved in a few more details, correcting the design. Irritated with this man's lack of manners, she finally snapped out the question:

"What are you working on anyway?"

" A design"

"What kind?"

"A circular one"

" Circular… Are you an alchemist?"

Finishing his design, he set the book back on the desk. This was stationed in a cold corner away from the torches.

" Doctor"

"_You?"_"What?" He asked, insulted by her tone. Her question finally caused him to look up at her.

"How old are you?"

"18"

"And you're a doctor."

"I've been studying all my life! Who are you to judge?"

"You rude-!"

" I'm rude? I bring you in so you don't freeze to death on top of everything else the disease would do to you anyway, and you say I'm too young to know anything about anything in a profession I've been studying since I could say 'take two and write me in the morning!'"

At this, she exploded. The stress of simply trying to survive had shortened her fuse considerably. "I'm serious! I could be dying and you don't care! How could you even call yourself a doc-!"

Before she could finish her tirade, she felt his warm palm on her forehead, pushing back her chocolate colored wavy hair.

" …. You're fine. You're room temperature. You likely passed out from either starvation or fatigue. When's the last time you ate?"

"… How long has it been since you've found me?"

"Mid-day"

She turned her green eyes to a small slit that served as a window and stars glittered back at her.

"I don't know… I suppose a day and a half?"

"Did you eat any bread ?"

"Not in two days."

"Don't eat bread. Or cattle meat. If anything, fish is best, but you want to get it from a river with a bit of a current."

"Why? Is that the cure?"

"No, but there might be a connection to the illness and the bread and the cattle meat. All the plague victims that managed to talk in full sentences without moaning said they ate one of the two. As for the occasional healthy villager, I asked what they ate, and they said they went fishing for dinner from a river here."

She forgot her indignance and listened, intrigued.

"… That design you were making, what does it do?"

"Hopefully it compresses the air density, heats it, and lets fire perch on the torch. That's my theory." he told her, honestly

"Theory?"

"… yes"

"So what is this theory of yours?"

He gave her a look filled with suspicion, then nodded and told her to get some rest.

"I'm already rested."

"Then stay put." he told her brusquely as he took up the unlit torch and went outside.

He might have been right. She figured she might not be sick…. Yet.. The disease always took a day or two to show itself. She had enough time to see what he was testing out. She had heard of the alchemists who were supposed to help the lords and ladies of the country or otherwise be tied to the royal family but never seen one face to face. They seemed to have more stock in them then the scientists that would tinker in their own labs all day, claiming to have found new elements when everyone knew there could only be four elements on this earth.

Alchemists were never allowed to say what they were since royals never liked to share their talents. If one were to admit their station, they could be kidnapped by highwaymen on one of their trips to or from the castle.

Laws were even set up so that only one of the Royal family could learn from them. There were certainly no chance of a commoner taking up the art.

Yet he looked far from royal. And he seemed to know it all the same. While he denied the claim, there was only one profession that needed "circular designs" like the one he was carving. Angelina only stayed there a minute before running after him.

Angelina took care not to let her footsteps make a sound when they hit the earth as she ran after the strange (cute) alchemist. Even when following him into the woods that cold winter, with the ground loaded with tree roots and rocks, she retained enough grace not to be heard or noticed. Her target only looked back once before quickening his pace with the unused torch still in his hand. That movement made Angelina nervous. She hadn't heard herself… had he?

Still, he and his personal spy approached a field in the forest, large enough where the sky was unblocked by tree branches and the grass was lit by the stars and the half-moon.

The 18-year old squinted and found the carving on the torch. He pressed his thumbs over it, lightly before concentrating on the element of fire. He didn't notice Angelina as she crept closer and hid in a bush. From there, she watched the strange boy hold up the unlit torch and stand there, like a statue of a man praying that she normally saw at the cathedral.

_Come on… fire… work… please work_

When nothing happened after a few minutes, he pressed harder and pinched his eyes shut, as though the extra effort would count for something.

Angelina was about to stand and leave when a flame roared to life at the tip, as though the torch had been doused with oils and fats.

Both teenagers dropped their jaws at the sight. The self-pronounced alchemist laughed excitedly at his achievement, just barely managing not to bounce around with excitement

The light was enough for him to discover Angelina, hiding in the bushes. His expression could not have pulled a more complete 180. He changed from elated to furious and fearful in the span of, at most, 5 seconds

"What are you doing out here? You might not have been infected before but now...!"

"Where'd that flame come from? How did you do that?" She asked with the same measure of excitement he once had.

"You saw… how much did you see?"

"I-"

"How much?" He demanded

"… all of it" she answered nervously. She couldn't understand why he was so mad

He marched over to her, grabbed her arm, and pulled her along to the monastery. As soon as they stepped out of the woods, he extinguished the torch.

"Wait a minute! What was that? I won't tell if it's a secret, honest!" she insisted

He didn't answer her until they were inside the monastery. Even in the dead of night, the monastery was lit by torch after torch making it as bright as mid-morning inside.

He scratched the transmutation circle off the torch and threw it into the fire place. The heated tongues of fire licked away the evidence. Angelina swallowed hard as she stared at it. The boy's sharp whispering tone as well his hand ensnaring her wrist snapped her attention from the disappearing torch. From there, she saw he was not much taller than her. His build was a wiry one but it lied. He had strength hidden in his arms despite how thin they were.

"You have to swear on your soul you'll never tell anyone what you saw"

"I swear it. But in return, I'd like to be your apprentice."

He frowned at her, feeling both trapped and stupid for setting that one up

"Make me your apprentice and I'll keep every kind of secret you want me to! I swear it!"

He glared at her a bit then sighed.

"Fine. But the minute you tell-!" "I know. I won't say a word."

When it was clear she would not tell, he let her go. Angelina watched him guardedly, wondering if he'd lash out again.

"Good.. We have a deal then. You don't tell and I'll teach you everything I know"

Below that harsh, frightening tone, she picked up on a nervous desperation. She felt some of her strength come back after seeing it.

"Deal… don't ever grab me like that again" she warned.

"Sorry. I didn't mean to scare you. You just don't get how important it is not to let that get out. I don't know what it was like in your village, but here, they're looking for any kind of scapegoat for the plague. I can't afford to slip up. Got it?"

"Yes"

"Good" he muttered again.

She glanced at his wrist while he told her what that entailed. It was just as thin as her own… famine might have been just as bad here as at home.

"You're going to want sleep. You're going to have to get up before dawn." He warned as he started for his own room.

"I never got your name"

"I never gave it."

"Maybe you want to give it now that we made a deal." She told him stubbornly. He turned to this girl, intrigued by her willful personality.

" …. It's Ashton. And your name is…?"

"Angelina"

"Well, Angelina, you are going to have to get used to this place if you insist on being an apprentice. The monks get up before the dawn"

Angelina nervously took her sick-bed for what was left of the night.


End file.
